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College liberals spurn $10M gift from Koch brothers

They may teach business classes at Brooklyn College, but the school’s liberal leaders have told two of the country’s top businessmen to take their money and shove it because they don’t like their conservative politics, a veteran faculty member charges.

The CUNY college has turned down a $10 million grant offer from the Koch brothers, said business professor Mitchell Langbert — who called the decision by School of Business Dean William Hopkins a knee-jerk reaction to the mega-rich industrialists’ support of Republican causes.

“It’s political correctness. It’s intolerance about anyone who doesn’t toe the left-wing line,” Langbert told The Post.

Langbert was so upset that he fired off a letter to members of the state Senate Education Committee protesting the school’s refusal to take the donation.

“The Charles G. Koch Foundation has repeatedly called Brooklyn College and me personally with an offer of as much as a $10 million grant,” he told the senators. “This grant would have been considerably larger than any that I have seen in my nearly quarter century of teaching.”

This isn’t the first time that liberals have tried to stop Charles and David Koch from doing good with their combined $100 billion fortune.

Activists from the NAACP and the hospital-employee union SEIU Local 1199 in March protested their $100 million donation to build a new wing for cancer patients at New York-Presbyterian Hospital.

The Kochs are despised by Democrats for pumping hundreds of millions of dollars into political advocacy groups helping to elect Republicans and attacking liberal causes.

Despite this, Langbert says that he, Brooklyn College and the Koch Foundation had been in discussions for nearly a year about establishing a financial center at Brooklyn College — possibly in partnership with the CUNY Graduate Center, correspondence obtained by The Post reveals.

After months of talks, the project stalled, Langbert said. So, in a June 9 e-mail, he asked Hopkins to “fish or cut bait [accept or reject the proposal].”

Hopkins responded: “I will have to ‘cut bait’ on this project. I need to focus my attention on the task I was hired to do; get the School of Business accredited.”

“I have never seen a dean not interested in a $10,000 grant, much less a $10 million one,” Langbert said.

The school responded to Langbert’s claims by saying, “The phrase cut bait was connected to the Dean’s need to focus on accreditation, which is why he was hired.”

Spokesman Jason Carey said a business faculty member got a $5,000 Koch grant in 2013 — but in regard to any more funding, “We have neither received an offer from, nor submitted a proposal to the Koch Foundation at this time for the business school.”

The Koch Foundation declined requests for comment.